WEBVTT

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At this point, I need to
say a couple of things

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about this poem, I think.

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It's a poem called
"School Figures."

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The title refers, by the
time the poem gets done,

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to a number of things.

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But I had primarily
in mind the phrase

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as it's used in
competitive ice skating.

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Competitive ice skating, I
mean, we see it in the Olympics.

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They televise it.

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And what we see is the most
glamorous and spectacular part.

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This is the part
where Peggy Fleming,

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or whoever this year's
model of Peggy Fleming

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is in that long line
of figure skaters,

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skates in a diaphanous
gown to Ravel's "Bolero"

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and does spectacular moves.

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That's called "free skating."

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And the skaters have to do
six or eight given maneuvers

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during the time that
they're doing that,

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and they have to do those with
a certain degree of skill.

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But the whole rest
of the routine

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can be put together in order
to be dramatic, and flashy,

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and exciting, and to stir
up interest and so forth.

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But that's the second
part of the competition.

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The first part, which I don't
think is usually televised,

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is school figures.

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And the one reason why
it's not usually televised

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is because it's the dullest
sport known to humans.

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And it is not dull
to the participants,

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but it has no spectator
interest of any particular kind,

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unless you were an absolute
crazed aficionado of ice

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skating.

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People go out and
they make figures,

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and they retrace them
over and over again.

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The one everybody knows
is the Figure Eight.

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Here's how you're
supposed to make that.

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You have to try and
transcribe a perfect eight.

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But being more-- you're
eight won't be quite perfect.

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So then what you
have to do after that

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is duplicate your
error each time

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without deviating from that.

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There's something wonderfully
fiendish about that.

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Surely this is the
most puritanical

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of all sports events, where
you retrace your error

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over and over and over again.

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[LAUGHTER]

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My sister has become,
in her adult life,

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a professional dancer
of some real skill and--

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and achievement, years
of incredible hard work,

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unbelievably cranky
diets, and so

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what began the life that
led her to that odd state

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by being a child figure skater.

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And starting at the
age of about five,

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she would push off onto the ice
at this little backwater ice

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arena in Troy, Ohio, where
the Hobart Manufacturing

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Company that makes scales,
and restaurant supplies,

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and arc welding equipment,
and so forth had,

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as a gift to the town,
50% of whose members

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Hobart had underpaid
for 38 years running,

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gave the town an arena and
bought them a minor league

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hockey team.

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And indoor ice
came to Troy, Ohio.

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And my sister was one
of the first persons

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to scratch that ice up.

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She was about five,
and they put her

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in one of those crazy
little costumes.

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And this tiny child with
little braids and the sort

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of stricken look
on her face, which

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meant loosely, I
like this, but I

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have no idea why
I'm doing it, would

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go out every morning
on the ice and work

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for an hour and a half.

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I would often accompany her.

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And the adults, same
people, were asleep.

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It'd be 5:30 in the morning
when we'd go over to the arena.

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This poem is about that;
it's called "School Figures."

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It's best to work before dawn--

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fresh ice, its surface
silvered and opaque.

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And you scritch out
onto the milky ice,

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not avid for grammar,
too sleepy for speech.

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It's not that
you're marking time;

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you're melting it grainy
under your runners.

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Each time you sweep in your
half-sleep around the figure

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eight, your blades
are duller and record

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how far you've slid from
your margin of error, zero.

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That's why you
skate it backwards.

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It's where you've been you
have to go again, alert enough

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to numb every muscle
memory but one.

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So much learning is
forgetting the many mistakes

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for the few lines
clear of the flourishes

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you thought were
style but were only

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personality, indelible
as that seemed.

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Who but you could forge
those stern exclusions?

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Where the line of
concentration crosses itself,

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cutting and tying its knot both,
there learning and forgetting

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are one attention,
and are the thrall

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that pulls you
stiff-ankled over the eyes

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before dawn, turning
over your shoulder

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as if you could skate
back into your first path

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and get it right for once.

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